D&D Strategy idea: suppose a party (just for example, the one on the blog) is in a fairly high risk but linear situation: like, say, we're heading toward the entrance to the citadel of light, but there's probably some ghoulies gonna jump out at us along the way.

Does it seem to be a good/bad idea to send one guy forward to "beat the bushes"? Points for this seem to be:

• Party gets to choose the likely target, instead of having the magic users get smacked
• Party's good ranged attacks can potentially be used along with good melee attacks
• Attacks and traps that could affect several party members only get one

In addition, if the front guy can be sneaky, there's the chance of detecting ambushes, traps, et cetera before setting them off.

In the negative category is really only one big one that I can see, with its various corollaries:

• Increases chance of the party getting separated.

Now, getting separated can work out very badly. And this scheme definitely opens the possibility that the point man could fall down a pit, or get surrounded, or otherwise spirited away from the party.

But realistically, how often is that going to happen when it wasn't going to happen already? If a wall falls down between the party and the lead, it might have been to cut off a retreat -- in which case it's not such a bad idea to have people on the other side who can maybe rescue you -- or it was to cut the party in half, maybe with someone under the wall.

So, now that the blog party is walkin' the halls of the Citadel of Light, howzabout Barik (or someone) tries to tiptoe ahead and play scout (not when we're up against doorways, but for those long halls)?